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06 September 2012

Our Last day In Cameroun

Dear Friends,

Two days ago was our last day in Cameroun, and i intended to write, but....... you will read about here.

It was our last day in Cameroun; we finished off with a good meeting with the secretary general of the ministry of water and energy, they are open to new concepts, we are trying to introduce a more long term approach for projects which will allow sustainability for a longer time, as in most African countries and projects the main issue is the longevity of the projects, they just don’t last, be it because of lack of maintenance, lack of training, constrained funding and unfortunately insufficient pre project planning. We hope to introduce to the government a project with a new concept, which looks at the water issue of the region from the macro holistic view rather than an exsistential one and although it might cost a bit more, will last longer.

The secretary general and myself

We traveled 4 hours back to Douala, ate banana chips which are salty here, they were really good and sugar covered peanuts also good, a wholesome dinner....I was not able to sleep, as usual in my travels, but luckily at some point they put on a movie "the gods fell on their head" #2, I remember this south African movie form the 80s and I saw #1 , #2 was just as funny and heartwarming, we felt that the surrealisticscenes in the movie were just as surreal as Avi and myself watching this 80s movie, dubbed in French, on a Cameroun 4 hour bus drive to Douala!

the peanuts on the bus (we already ate the bananas)

Came to the hotel, and although we had a good experience last time, this time, there was no internet, so I called for the reception they said they would bring me a cable, I waited patently and they brought me a cable, then I saw there was no AC, so I called again and then I went to the toilet to find that there was no toilet seat, that was about as much as I could take at 11:00 at night after 4 hours drive, but I was very calm about it (and they were really sorry) and patiently waited until they changed my room, and then there was AC, a toilet seat, but the internet cable didn’t work, so disappointed but very sleepy, I went to bed, hoping I can find a wifi in the morning to send you this blog. but didn't until right now! two days later.

Food

We really enjoyed the food in Cameroun and had a great local variety, from the kitchen of El Hadj's wife, she is a great cook and wonderful host, to the traditional restaurant with African music and even the restaurant in the hotel, the food was great.

the restaurant le Paysans, villages of Africa, with live african music

The swirly things are a tapioca type mixture which makes the local “bread” called Baton de Manioc, the tapioca type bread